End of land lines

[ChrisR]

There were a couple of posts in the Wireless 6 Router thread about the end of Land lines (eg mine https://www.talkphotography.co.uk/threads/wireless-6-router.761591/post-9517102), which were off topic for that thread. I thought it might be worth while having a thread about this. There's a UK Gov post about the end of land lines at https://www.gov.uk/guidance/uk-transition-from-analogue-to-digital-landlines, which includes links to OFCOM guidance for "vulnerable customers". New to me was that there will be some providers for those who don't have a broadband connection at all; likely not to include many here directly, but I'm aware my sister-in-law doesn't have broadband.

 

[ChrisR]

Starting to think about this, I was a bit bothered about the issue of extensions. We have one main BT access point and two extensions; the main access and one of the extensions don't have power available conveniently. We currently run our FTTC broadband connection off one of the extensions via a cable from the dongle thingy, that goes under the carpet to the other side of the fireplace, where there is power for the router.

I'm guessing that when we're forced into this change, we'd probably move to FTTP (there's a cabinet outside the house), which would presumably mean a new fibre cable anyway, so I guess that could easily come in the other side of the fireplace. I spent some time wondering how the other extension phones could be connected, but I guess using DECT phones would be the best option there, ignore the wiring altogether!

 

[ecoleman]

I'm guessing that when we're forced into this change, we'd probably move to FTTP (there's a cabinet outside the house), which would presumably mean a new fibre cable anyway, so I guess that could easily come in the other side of the fireplace. I spent some time wondering how the other extension phones could be connected, but I guess using DECT phones would be the best option there, ignore the wiring altogether!

Cordless VOIP phones can be used. Most of which still use their own 2.4Ghz signal from a base to a handset.
I've also seen one or two wifi phones here and there where the handset just connects to your wifi. I suspect these will become more main stream.

 

[Boots]

We used to have extensions peppered throughout the house, some in use, most not. But it transpired they were causing masses of data errors for our broadband.

We chopped out everything except the master socket. The router is there, and very happy now, along with out DECT base station (now VOIP).

 

[Carabosse]

The plan is to end all conventional landline connections by 2025 in the UK.

The good(ish) news is that most cordless phones will work with broadband connection. The base has to be plugged into the router rather than the wall socket.

With the mobile phone becoming the norm, many people are deciding to ditch their landlines altogether and save themselves money.

 

[JohnMcL7]

Starting to think about this, I was a bit bothered about the issue of extensions. We have one main BT access point and two extensions; the main access and one of the extensions don't have power available conveniently. We currently run our FTTC broadband connection off one of the extensions via a cable from the dongle thingy, that goes under the carpet to the other side of the fireplace, where there is power for the router.

I'm guessing that when we're forced into this change, we'd probably move to FTTP (there's a cabinet outside the house), which would presumably mean a new fibre cable anyway, so I guess that could easily come in the other side of the fireplace. I spent some time wondering how the other extension phones could be connected, but I guess using DECT phones would be the best option there, ignore the wiring altogether!

Yes you should be able to choose where the cable comes in and DECT is one easy solution for phones round the house although from what I can recall, it's possible to re-use internal phone wiring once the master socket is disconnected. I had a DECT phone setup so when I went to FTTP I migrated the number to a VOIP service then set that up on an ATA (Analogue Telephone Adapter) and connected the DECT base to the router and works the same as before. There are some advantages to VOIP in that it's more flexible so you can have your landline number essentially anywhere you have an internet connection so with some VOIP services it's possible to have the landline going to your mobile which I've found useful when on holiday and expecting a call on a certain number.

BT have announced SOTAP (Single Order Transitional Access Product) which will allow non-broadband customers to have a product similar to a landline:

Openreach to Pilot Alternative UK Analogue Phone Line in May 2024

Openreach (BT) has informed ISPs and phone providers of their plan to pilot the new SOTAP for Analogue product from 1st May 2024, which is a phone line service

www.ispreview.co.uk

This should function in a power outage which has been a criticism of the migration from PSTN to VOIP as long as the exchange remains powered. I see frequent comments about BT's decision to shut down PSTN but it's not a choice, the technology is old and no longer supported so they have to move on from it,

 

[Plain Nev]

Call me a complete numpty, but if we don't have landlines and hubs, where is your wireless signal going to come from? Does this mean that we will be reliant on expensive mobile connections?

 

[ecoleman]

Call me a complete numpty, but if we don't have landlines and hubs, where is your wireless signal going to come from? Does this mean that we will be reliant on expensive mobile connections?

FTTP (Fibre to the Property). They are doing away copper cable installs.

 

[Plain Nev]

FTTP (Fibre to the Property). They are doing away copper cable installs.

Ahh, I understood that.

 

[leaky5]

My mums power tripped recently, took out the BB and DECT phones and she had forgotten to charge here mobile, also now could ot charge it.

So had to pop round to see if one of the neighbours could reset the fuse board for her, she could not reach to get the front cover open.
Normally she would just call me for any issued like this

 

[AndrewFlannigan]

Fibre to the Property can only replace Copper properly, if there is an independent power source all the way from the exchange to the property.

Nobody has yet explained how they are going to replace this most vital communications facility. There's been a lot of double talk but it all comes down to "there, there, don't worry your pretty little head about it". The reality is that self powered copper is a reliable and hardened system but thanks to the tory obsession with a "free market", we're going to replace it with a system that will fail, just when it is most needed.

 

[bass_junkie83]

BT sent me a new hub a few weeks ago and are constantly emailing me to get it set up to use my landline.

The reality is the last BT hub went in the bin in favour for something more reliable and we haven't actually plugged a handset into our landline since we moved in nearly a decade ago. Really can't see the point of it in the day of mobile phones.

 

[Plain Nev]

Fibre to the Property can only replace Copper properly, if there is an independent power source all the way from the exchange to the property.

That would have to be how it worked. In which case the advantages would seem to be minimal, as far as I can see. Unless they plan on building wireless hubs all over the place. Again, that's a lay mans point of view.

 

[woof woof]

I'm worried by the trend to push everything online and one reason is that hardly a day goes by here without some sort of internet related issue and these can be anything from a go slow to complete outage.

We have a landline but mostly use mobiles as they're cheaper than the landline these days but I wouldn't want to give up the landline for those once in a blue moon times which could happen when the internet and/or mobile systems may be out when we need them.

 

[ecoleman]

BT sent me a new hub a few weeks ago and are constantly emailing me to get it set up to use my landline.

The reality is the last BT hub went in the bin in favour for something more reliable and we haven't actually plugged a handset into our landline since we moved in nearly a decade ago. Really can't see the point of it in the day of mobile phones.

We unplugged our home phone a year or so ago too although we still pay for the line with our BB package for now. With mobile phones I don't see the point but I do understand that some folk who can't get a mobile signal at home or the elderly may rely on a traditional landline.

I suspect that much of the equipment in BT boxes is protected with a UPS or some form of power backup so a small UPS on your home router could deal with the odd outage.

 

[woof woof]

BT sent me a new hub a few weeks ago and are constantly emailing me to get it set up to use my landline.

The reality is the last BT hub went in the bin in favour for something more reliable and we haven't actually plugged a handset into our landline since we moved in nearly a decade ago. Really can't see the point of it in the day of mobile phones.

A while ago something major happened at my mobile supplier and my automatic contract renewal didn't go through so for several weeks I was left with a brick. Talking to them was a compete clown show. Even when I gave up and went to a new supplier it took weeks for my phone to swapped over.

My confidence in new tech is pretty low. IMVHO we shouldn't be reliant on these systems until they can be proven to work reliably and not just in the major cities and not just for the tech savvy. These systems need to work nationally and for all people otherwise they are just not ready.

 

[hockeyumps48]

I am unsure about going digital only. I have fibre to cabinet (about 800 metres away) and that is the best Plus Net can do. A few weeks ago we had a power cut in the area so everything went down including mobile phone masts. At least with powered copper wire I could plug in my old phone to find out what was happening. If it goes totally digital I would have no communication at all in a power cut, very unsatisfactory.

 

[AndrewFlannigan]

I suspect that much of the equipment in BT boxes is protected with a UPS or some form of power backup so a small UPS on your home router could deal with the odd outage.

That is all right for minor outages but the copper system is designed to handle major outages, which may last for days.

Originally, each exchange had its own generators and the network could maintain power indefinitely. Unless each hub is similarly protected, a major outage could wipe out communications and it's not far fetched to imagine it could put lives at risk,

Yet again, we're having to put up with the consequences of an "I'm all right, Jack", greed driven view of how our country should be run, instead of thinking how we avoid problems.

 

[ecoleman]

That is all right for minor outages but the copper system is designed to handle major outages, which may last for days.

Originally, each exchange had its own generators and the network could maintain power indefinitely. Unless each hub is similarly protected, a major outage could wipe out communications and it's not far fetched to imagine it could put lives at risk,

Yet again, we're having to put up with the consequences of an "I'm all right, Jack", greed driven view of how our country should be run, instead of thinking how we avoid problems.

Of course if we weren't hell bent on renewable only energy then we probably wouldn't have to worry about outages that last for days. I suspect that we will see that in the not too distant future unless the powers that be realise that we simply can not reply on sun and wind to power the country.

As for the changes being greed driven, I think that's a bit far fetched. We are all demanding faster and more reliable internet which simply can not be achieved with copper cable. Does there need to be some sort of redundancy? Sure but sticking with copper isn't really feasible.

I'm from South Africa where power outages would occur regularly and last for 12+ hours where infrastructure had been damaged by lightning (this is before the ANC took over and trashed the electrical system which now requires daily outages). Since moving back to the UK in 2024 I don't think I've seen more than half a dozen power cuts and non have lasted more than a few minutes.

 

[Plain Nev]

It's not greed driven. It's stupidity driven. As always people are in love with the idea of it. It's one of those things they can trumpet as an achievement without ever stopping to think about the practicalities. It's like green energy and electric cars. That's all progress is, a flash in the pan that sounds good.

 

[Carabosse]

Just to add you can generally use your mobile phone as a VOIP "landline" if you set it up appropriately.That way you are not dependent on the mobile signal.

You could then chuck your conventional (corded or cordless) landline phone in the bin. I haven't quite been able to bring myself to do that yet!

 

[AndrewFlannigan]

Of course if we weren't hell bent on renewable only energy then we probably wouldn't have to worry about outages that last for days.

The sort of outages that I have in mind are floods, major fires, excessive snowfall, deliberate sabotage.

As for the changes being greed driven, I think that's a bit far fetched.

We'll have to agree to disagree. Splitting up BT was typical Thatcherist greedonomics: "here you are lads, buy this government department that has cost a vast amount to create and do with it as you will. Trebbles all round!"

We are all demanding faster and more reliable internet which simply can not be achieved with copper cable.

I think the word "all" may be a reach. In any case, I'm not against fibre as an alternative to copper but I'm very much against it as a replacement unless the obvious problems are solved first.

Does there need to be some sort of redundancy? Sure but sticking with copper isn't really feasible.

Why is it not feasible? It's already in place and there's a tremendous amount of skill and knowledge on how to build and maintain the infrastructure.

Since moving back to the UK in 2024 I don't think I've seen more than half a dozen power cuts and non have lasted more than a few minutes.

You've been extraordinarily lucky. I've experienced numerous outages over the last seventy years.

 

[hunnymonster]

The plan is to end all conventional landline connections by 2025 in the UK.

And that it was first announced in 2016.

Edit:typo

 

[JohnMcL7]

A while ago something major happened at my mobile supplier and my automatic contract renewal didn't go through so for several weeks I was left with a brick. Talking to them was a compete clown show. Even when I gave up and went to a new supplier it took weeks for my phone to swapped over.

My confidence in new tech is pretty low. IMVHO we shouldn't be reliant on these systems until they can be proven to work reliably and not just in the major cities and not just for the tech savvy. These systems need to work nationally and for all people otherwise they are just not ready.

None of this is new technology, VOIP and FTTP have been on the go for many, many years and work reliably. In fact more reliably than the old copper based technology which is highly prone to noise on the line, it's one of the main reasons I wanted to change from FTTC to FTTP because I was fed up with sync issues on the line no-one could sort.

The problems you've described with your mobile phone can and do happen with landlines all the time except it's actually a plus for mobile phones, you can easily go get a cheap sim and use call forwarding to tide you over but there's no quick fix for a problematic landline. Same goes for VOIP, since it's no longer tied to anything you have full flexibility how you use it.

It's not greed driven. It's stupidity driven. As always people are in love with the idea of it. It's one of those things they can trumpet as an achievement without ever stopping to think about the practicalities. It's like green energy and electric cars. That's all progress is, a flash in the pan that sounds good.

I really have no idea what on earth you're talking about, FTTP is one of the biggest and best improvements there's been in home network technology for a long time. It's significantly more reliable having a dedicated data connection instead of the shared line nonsense we've been stuck with for many years and it's far, far faster as well. It's absurd to suggest it's all 'stupidity' and there's no progress.

And it's completely wrong to claim they 'haven't thought of the practicalities' - if you really want a functioning landline in a power cut since apparently you think FTTP is 'stupid' then you will be covered with SOTAP as mentioned above.

 

[Plain Nev]

No, not stupid. Although, the people who trumpet these initiatives often are. When have you ever known one of them work properly, and in the timescale given? The point I was trying to make was that they often talk the talk. But that's about it. As regards the technical aspects I can only defer to your greater knowledge of the subject. All I can say is I hope you are right.

 

[JohnMcL7]

No, not stupid. Although, the people who trumpet these initiatives often are. When have you ever known one of them work properly, and in the timescale given? The point I was trying to make was that they often talk the talk. But that's about it. As regards the technical aspects I can only defer to your greater knowledge of the subject. All I can say is I hope you are right.

Ironically you have it back to front, the problem with fttp deployment in the UK is that BT have been far too slow with it - they haven't raced into it as some seem to think, they've hugely dragged their heels on the technology allowing altnets (non-BT companies who are installing their own networks to home) to move in first. Fibre networking itself has been in the go for many years but up until now has been too expensive for wider deployments, not because it's an inferior technology to copper.

As I've said above, the move from pstn is not BT's choice. It is pretty much a dead technology now with no more support so bt cannot continue with it.

There is certainly a need to improve resilience in mobile phone Masts because it's not just home users that will be relying on it more but many others (including emergency communication systems)

 

[Plain Nev]

Ironically you have it back to front, the problem with fttp deployment in the UK is that BT have been far too slow with it - they haven't raced into it as some seem to think, they've hugely dragged their heels on the technology allowing altnets (non-BT companies who are installing their own networks to home) to move in first. Fibre networking itself has been in the go for many years but up until now has been too expensive for wider deployments, not because it's an inferior technology to copper.

As I've said above, the move from pstn is not BT's choice. It is pretty much a dead technology now with no more support so bt cannot continue with it.

There is certainly a need to improve resilience in mobile phone Masts because it's not just home users that will be relying on it more but many others (including emergency communication systems)

Yes, that was my fault for not being specific and being prone to generalisations. I think you're right. I do have a friend that was involved in just such a project in the West Midlands. And it pretty much echoes what you've said. Although, I can't help thinking it does also highlight the disparity between what's said and what's done.

 

[Sangoma]

We haven't had a landline for about 10 years now.
We had a phone that looked like a land line that could plug into the network, connect to the network on wifi, and had a sim card for a data connection should the network fail. It had a built in battery that lasted about a week without power.
That been in a box in the garage for 5 years now, all we use now are cell phones.

Our broadband is coaxial cable, which does not count as copper (though of course it is) for the ending of service in 2025.

Fibre is a complete dogs breakfast. CityFibre installed cables in the street, the end of the cable for our house was placed in a position that they would have to dig across 30' of tar driveway and a shrubbery to get to the house, if they had put it 12' away from where it is, it could have just gone down the side of the drive.
They dug up the one junction box on the corner of two streets 4 times because of problems, other people waited for ages to get a working connection.
For some reason, they did not put a cable to all the houses, so now if one of those houses wants a connection, they have to dig up the same path/trench each time.

Our BT landlines was hopelessly unreliable, used to fail completely 4-5 times a year due to aluminium cables breaking.

The cost of broadband is ridiculous now too.

The whole affair makes it look like a Flintstones effort compared to some third world countries.

 

[woof woof]

None of this is new technology, VOIP and FTTP have been on the go for many, many years and work reliably. In fact more reliably than the old copper based technology which is highly prone to noise on the line, it's one of the main reasons I wanted to change from FTTC to FTTP because I was fed up with sync issues on the line no-one could sort.

The problems you've described with your mobile phone can and do happen with landlines all the time except it's actually a plus for mobile phones, you can easily go get a cheap sim and use call forwarding to tide you over but there's no quick fix for a problematic landline. Same goes for VOIP, since it's no longer tied to anything you have full flexibility how you use it.

I really have no idea what on earth you're talking about, FTTP is one of the biggest and best improvements there's been in home network technology for a long time. It's significantly more reliable having a dedicated data connection instead of the shared line nonsense we've been stuck with for many years and it's far, far faster as well. It's absurd to suggest it's all 'stupidity' and there's no progress.

And it's completely wrong to claim they 'haven't thought of the practicalities' - if you really want a functioning landline in a power cut since apparently you think FTTP is 'stupid' then you will be covered with SOTAP as mentioned above.

Not in my experience but that may be because of location. As I said above, it's not enough for a tech to work in certain areas and for certain people and if that's what it does IMO it just isn't ready no matter how long it's been out.

Oh, and I don't know how you can claim VOIP works reliably. I've just googled it and found you need broadband which brings me back to possible questions of coverage and reliability, assuming you believe me when I say that broadband issue are common for me plus...

Google says...

"What are the disadvantages of VoIP?

Possible threats include identity and service theft, phishing, viruses and malware, spamming over internet telephony, call tempering and denial of service attacks. Extra costs - if you use VoIP to phone someone without VoIP capabilities, you can incur additional costs."

You think this is the future? Wonderful.

I do appreciate that people like new tech especially when it works for them. I worked in tech for nearly 30 years and I see the appeal but my gripe is that it isn't always a clear step forward for a significant number of people and with essential services, and I'd argue that a phone is essential for many people we should be ensuring as full and as reliable and as accessible and as useable system as possible and certainly any new system should surpass the existing system before replacing it.

 

[woof woof]

The whole affair makes it look like a Flintstones effort compared to some third world countries.

Thailand isn't a third world country but I did ask Mrs WW about the little boxes they all have near their TV's and if they get any problems. "All the time" was the reply.

Aren't UK broadband charges quite reasonable when looking at other countries?

 

[woof woof]

Just a general thing on Tech.

There do seem to be people who like it and are very happy to read, talk and tech fondle even to the point of mentally blocking out potential issues and downsides and just seeing the advantages for them. We see this with smartphones, some people just can not put them down. I like the benefits but my hand is not permanently attached to tech and I'm able to put it down and do something else. Even when I worked both for manufacturers and in 3rd party maintenance my interest in the tech usually dropped through the floor when I'd fixed the fault and on I'd then move.

I do wonder how much of the love for VOIP and all the rest replacing land lines is down to tech fondling rather than for real advantages.

People may not agree, it's just a thought I had.

 

[Harlequin565]

No mobile coverage at my house, father-in-law is 93 and his views on the internet can be summed up in one short, terse, angry word. He has an alarm call thing round his neck (that doesn't work on VOIP) and the landline is to him, just like it was for many back in the 80s/90s - a lifeline. My wife is disabled and needs to be able to ring a neighbour if she falls when I'm not around. It's a lifeline for us too.

We've just switched supplier from NowTV who seemed unable to lift an outgoing call bar on my landline for almost 6 weeks. The new supplier is fibre, and the phone has switched from copper to internet. Now, a power outage will knock out the phones as well as the internet. Local exchanges had battery backups for a long time (don't know if they switched to UPS at some point, but hey ho) and we've always been able to at least use the phone in the event of a power outage. Somehow VOIP is being badged as "better". It is until it isn't. Crowdstrike v2 anyone?

And re: Greed - I'm agreed on that. Having worked in telecoms for 35 years, I've seen teams slimmed down to the point of emaciation by cuts designed to increase profits. This results in lack of proper testing, overworked and badly treated employees, vulnerabilities not being patched out quickly or on time, no thought of whether change is good, just change for the sake of innovation, increased profit and "look what I did" on a CV.

 

[Harlequin565]

Just a general thing on Tech.

There do seem to be people who like it and are very happy to read, talk and tech fondle even to the point of mentally blocking out potential issues and downsides and just seeing the advantages for them. We see this with smartphones, some people just can not put them down. I like the benefits but my hand is not permanently attached to tech and I'm able to put it down and do something else. Even when I worked both for manufacturers and in 3rd party maintenance my interest in the tech usually dropped through the floor when I'd fixed the fault and on I'd then move.

I do wonder how much of the love for VOIP and all the rest replacing land lines is down to tech fondling rather than for real advantages.

People may not agree, it's just a thought I had.

I agree for what it's worth. The stuff they're doing with AI without thinking it through, just in the rush to deliver the next big thing, is quite scary.

 

[Sangoma]

Thailand isn't a third world country but I did ask Mrs WW about the little boxes they all have near their TV's and if they get any problems. "All the time" was the reply.

Aren't UK broadband charges quite reasonable when looking at other countries?

OK, replace "third world" with developing.
The term is not current, so it seems to have different meanings to different people.

As for prices, the UK seems to be in the top third in Europe https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-livi...ings?displayCurrency=USD&itemId=33&region=150

As for other places, my daughter pays about 70% of what we pay for the same speeds (SA), my sister in law in NZ pays about the same as us, but much higher speeds (Starlink), and the family in the Philippines pay about 20-25% of what we pay, their cable is good, their "wifi" in the less well served areas of towns not as good, and out of towns it is just cell connections.

These are based on the current exchange rates, but the Big Mac factor will of course affect the relative costs compared to salary.

 

[Stephen L]

We haven't had a landline for about 10 years now.
We had a phone that looked like a land line that could plug into the network, connect to the network on wifi, and had a sim card for a data connection should the network fail. It had a built in battery that lasted about a week without power.
That been in a box in the garage for 5 years now, all we use now are cell phones.

Our broadband is coaxial cable, which does not count as copper (though of course it is) for the ending of service in 2025.

Fibre is a complete dogs breakfast. CityFibre installed cables in the street, the end of the cable for our house was placed in a position that they would have to dig across 30' of tar driveway and a shrubbery to get to the house, if they had put it 12' away from where it is, it could have just gone down the side of the drive.
They dug up the one junction box on the corner of two streets 4 times because of problems, other people waited for ages to get a working connection.
For some reason, they did not put a cable to all the houses, so now if one of those houses wants a connection, they have to dig up the same path/trench each time.

Our BT landlines was hopelessly unreliable, used to fail completely 4-5 times a year due to aluminium cables breaking.

The cost of broadband is ridiculous now too.

The whole affair makes it look like a Flintstones effort compared to some third world countries.

Our fibre only goes underground as far as the nearest pole, using the same ducting as copper. From there the fibre cable is strung in exactly the same way as the copper was - fro the top of the pole to the top of the house. No digging involved.

 

[Sangoma]

Our fibre only goes underground as far as the nearest pole, using the same ducting as copper. From there the fibre cable is strung in exactly the same way as the copper was - fro the top of the pole to the top of the house. No digging involved.

We don't have any poles except streetlamps, everything is underground, no overhead cables at all

 

[Craikeybaby]

We haven't had a landline for about 10 years now.
We had a phone that looked like a land line that could plug into the network, connect to the network on wifi, and had a sim card for a data connection should the network fail. It had a built in battery that lasted about a week without power.
That been in a box in the garage for 5 years now, all we use now are cell phones.

Our broadband is coaxial cable, which does not count as copper (though of course it is) for the ending of service in 2025.

Fibre is a complete dogs breakfast. CityFibre installed cables in the street, the end of the cable for our house was placed in a position that they would have to dig across 30' of tar driveway and a shrubbery to get to the house, if they had put it 12' away from where it is, it could have just gone down the side of the drive.
They dug up the one junction box on the corner of two streets 4 times because of problems, other people waited for ages to get a working connection.
For some reason, they did not put a cable to all the houses, so now if one of those houses wants a connection, they have to dig up the same path/trench each time.

Our BT landlines was hopelessly unreliable, used to fail completely 4-5 times a year due to aluminium cables breaking.

The cost of broadband is ridiculous now too.

The whole affair makes it look like a Flintstones effort compared to some third world countries.

I had BT fibre installed a couple of years ago - pretty much as soon as it was available, and it has been great. The only issue is that most houses on my street now have a copper cable and a fiberoptic cable going from the pole to their house, because BT have not removed the old, unused cables. There was an issue on my street a few months back, where some joyriders (time travelled from the 80's?) crashed into a telegraph pole, snapping it, and BT took over a week to replace it. But that would also have been an issue for the copper landlines.

 

[Plain Nev]

I had BT fibre installed a couple of years ago - pretty much as soon as it was available, and it has been great. The only issue is that most houses on my street now have a copper cable and a fiberoptic cable going from the pole to their house, because BT have not removed the old, unused cables. There was an issue on my street a few months back, where some joyriders (time travelled from the 80's?) crashed into a telegraph pole, snapping it, and BT took over a week to replace it. But that would also have been an issue for the copper landlines.

I told that Marty to drive carefully.

 

[Sangoma]

I had BT fibre installed a couple of years ago - pretty much as soon as it was available, and it has been great. The only issue is that most houses on my street now have a copper cable and a fiberoptic cable going from the pole to their house, because BT have not removed the old, unused cables. There was an issue on my street a few months back, where some joyriders (time travelled from the 80's?) crashed into a telegraph pole, snapping it, and BT took over a week to replace it. But that would also have been an issue for the copper landlines.

From what I hear of others experiences, BT does give good service, we are on Virgin cable for broadband, which is faster than what we need, though not quite up to the very high fibre speeds, so never had the need to change.

 

[AndrewFlannigan]

I do wonder how much of the love for VOIP and all the rest replacing land lines is down to tech fondling rather than for real advantages.

You may say that but I couldn't possibly comment. Oh hell, yes I can... You're absolutely correct.

Now, a power outage will knock out the phones as well as the internet.

...which seems to be something that some people don't think will affect them, so it's "just a stupid claim".

Having worked in telecoms for 35 years, I've seen teams slimmed down to the point of emaciation by cuts designed to increase profits. This results in lack of proper testing, overworked and badly treated employees, vulnerabilities not being patched out quickly or on time, no thought of whether change is good, just change for the sake of innovation, increased profit and "look what I did" on a CV.

Been there, met the idiots. It's not to bad when you're a contractor and know that, in a few months you'll be somewhere else, but a lot of the telecoms people I've worked with are hard working and care about their jobs. It was appalling to see how some "management" treated them.

Then again, it tells you how little respect they have for their customers as well...